Feb 2016
We walked down unpaved roads, kicking up pebbles with our doc martins and inhaling cigarettes in between kisses.
We climbed over a gate marked "No Trespassing" almost every day last spring just to drink coffee with our feet dangling over mounds of white rocks, stacked like abstract sculptures.
We woke up at 6 AM to play on the swing sets at South Abington before kids flooded the mulch with runny noses and raspy voices.
We watched plow trucks sweep up all of our mistakes off of your road from the edge of your bed and counted how many maneuvers it took that driver just to get through your alley way.
You yelled at me for putting my frozen hand on your cheek after I went outside to heat up my car for work.
We sunbathed on your neighbor's roof when the kids were at school and their parents were *******.
We drank cheap beer in the bath tub and pretended we were going swimming.
We told your sister kissing would make her pregnant at your mother's cherry wood coffee table, and acted appalled when she replied, "Well then how come I'm not pregnant."
I rubbed your back as you cried with your hands balled up into fists on your front porch steps.
I sat silently on your bathroom floor while you tore through the house, breaking random things in frustration.
I cleaned the open cut on the side of your jaw with peroxide, and held your knees down with my forearm as you squirmed around in stinging pain, without ever getting a clear explanation as to how it got there.
I drove your sister to school & fumbled over my words after she asked why you don't wanna have dance parties with her anymore.
I sat in the hospital with your mother and read her the newspaper every night after work.
I tried to hold you in bed, but you pulled away from me.
And when spring came around again, I wanted to walk to the quarry but you just wanted to watch tv.
And when summer came around again, there were no make believe swimming pools.
You'd sit down in the shower with your hands over your face, and your legs curled into your chest, trying hard to catch your breath.
I'd put a towel in the dryer and wrap you in it afterward.
I held you as long and as hard as I could,
But you were slipping.
And the second you lost your footing,
And I lost my grip,
You took me down with you
And we hit rock bottom together.
So I guess,
It was never hate that I should've feared.
All along it was love
Because love is more destructive
than hate when it goes to the wrong place
We climbed over a gate marked "No Trespassing" almost every day last spring just to drink coffee with our feet dangling over mounds of white rocks, stacked like abstract sculptures.
We woke up at 6 AM to play on the swing sets at South Abington before kids flooded the mulch with runny noses and raspy voices.
We watched plow trucks sweep up all of our mistakes off of your road from the edge of your bed and counted how many maneuvers it took that driver just to get through your alley way.
You yelled at me for putting my frozen hand on your cheek after I went outside to heat up my car for work.
We sunbathed on your neighbor's roof when the kids were at school and their parents were *******.
We drank cheap beer in the bath tub and pretended we were going swimming.
We told your sister kissing would make her pregnant at your mother's cherry wood coffee table, and acted appalled when she replied, "Well then how come I'm not pregnant."
I rubbed your back as you cried with your hands balled up into fists on your front porch steps.
I sat silently on your bathroom floor while you tore through the house, breaking random things in frustration.
I cleaned the open cut on the side of your jaw with peroxide, and held your knees down with my forearm as you squirmed around in stinging pain, without ever getting a clear explanation as to how it got there.
I drove your sister to school & fumbled over my words after she asked why you don't wanna have dance parties with her anymore.
I sat in the hospital with your mother and read her the newspaper every night after work.
I tried to hold you in bed, but you pulled away from me.
And when spring came around again, I wanted to walk to the quarry but you just wanted to watch tv.
And when summer came around again, there were no make believe swimming pools.
You'd sit down in the shower with your hands over your face, and your legs curled into your chest, trying hard to catch your breath.
I'd put a towel in the dryer and wrap you in it afterward.
I held you as long and as hard as I could,
But you were slipping.
And the second you lost your footing,
And I lost my grip,
You took me down with you
And we hit rock bottom together.
So I guess,
It was never hate that I should've feared.
All along it was love
Because love is more destructive
than hate when it goes to the wrong place
